Stranger Than Kindness

by Mark A Radcliffe

  *

  Grace was sitting with peppermint tea, looking slightly flushed. It may have been the stairs. She was heavier than she had been twenty-four years ago and she was self conscious about it. ‘I’ve swollen,’ she said to Adam.

  He shrugged and said: ‘Haven’t we all? I used to have hair you know.’ She smiled. ‘It’s good to see you, Grace.’

  ‘You too.’

  ‘And you have a lovely daughter I didn’t know about.’ He said it gently, without rancour.

  Grace shrugged. ‘What to say, when to say it? I didn’t know if you would want to hear from me. I thought you might come back.’

  Adam nodded. ‘Do you need something to eat?’

  Grace paused long enough to encourage Adam to insist on heating up a little vegetable curry. ‘I’ve been driving a while and forgot to eat,’ she said.

  While he was in the kitchen he listened as the women he felt as though he had introduced talked about their children.

  ‘I’m hurt,’ said Grace. ‘Not that they are together but that they didn’t say anything.’

  ‘I know,’ said Anna. ‘And for so long.’

  Adam took his time, turning the reheating of vegetables into a slightly more complex task than growing them had been. When the exchange between the women had slowed, he turned out the kitchen light and came back with food, sat down and poured himself and Grace a glass of wine. Anna was reading the letter that Grace had brought with her.

  ‘Are you going?’ Grace asked.

  ‘I think so, yes,’ said Anna.

  They were quiet. It may have been that there was too much to say, thought Adam, about too many things. He took a deep breath, breathing out through his mouth, closing his eyes as he did so; at the top of his lungs he could feel that thin edge of fearfulness he remembered from the asylum. He took another deep breath and said, surprising himself as he did so,: ‘I was just about to tell Anna something about my last night at the hospital, and about finding Tim. I wonder, is that OK?’

  Grace smiled. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Of course. Look, I know this may sound insensitive, I liked Tim, he was nice, but in many ways I didn’t get to know him until after he was dead. Did you know he had cancer?’

  ‘I found out earlier today.’

  Grace looked at the floor then spoke quietly: ‘We slept together once. It probably had something to do with how angry I was with Norman, with myself. I don’t know.’ She hesitated. ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘For not trying to find you. For not seeing how you were.’

  The end of the living room where they were sitting was darker now without the light from the kitchen. There was no music playing, no sound from the streets. They were three old friends above a bookshop who didn’t really know each other and didn’t really mind.

  ‘When I found Tim, I suspect he was already dead.’

  Grace nodded. ‘The coroner’s report said he had been dead for quite a while.’

  Adam nodded. ‘Yes, but I held him for quite a while, Grace. By my reckoning, a really long time.’

  ‘How long?’

  Adam shrugged. ‘I couldn’t really work it out.’ He swallowed deeply and felt the fear spread right across his chest, down his arms, to his fingers. Why did it always swell in the tips of his fingers? ‘It might have been four or five hours…’

  ‘That isn’t possible.’ Anna said. ‘Not physically possible.’

  Adam nodded. ‘I know, but I got to the hospital before midnight, I saw Cassells and that skinny girl chatting outside.’

  ‘They had been at a presentation,’ said Anna. ‘I’d been there myself but I left early. I went to the ward and I saw Cassells there talking to Tim, who seemed upset. I didn’t want to talk to them so I went home. I’ve gone over that a million times… If I had stopped, spoken to Tim…’

  Grace touched Anna’s arm. ‘Yes and if I had not ignored his sulking, or smiled more, or sent him flowers… These are just ifs and ands,’ said Grace.

  Adam paused for a moment and then continued. ‘I saw them, Cassells and his friends, in the driveway and I walked the long way round to the annexe. I was going to walk down the corridor from the far side but then I saw Tim. I held him from that time until I went to get help’.

  ‘The inquest said the call was logged at 4.52. Ambulance arrived on the scene at 5.07,’ said Grace.

  ‘Adam, you couldn’t have held him from midnight until nearly five in the morning,’ Anna said.

  Adam looked at Anna. ‘I held him for as long as I could. After a while someone came, a young man. I’d seen him before around the place, a couple of times. Once in the middle of the night on the long corridor staring out of the window. I talked to him. I saw him in the garden where I found Tim. He came to help. He said he would hold Tim while I went for help.’

  ‘There was nothing about that in the coroner’s—’

  Adam put his hand up. ‘I never told anyone.’

  ‘Why not?’ said Anna.

  ‘Because when I got back he was gone. There was no trace, nothing to suggest he had ever been there. I thought that I must have… imagined him.’

  The women sat in silence for a moment.

  ‘Adam, Tim was dead long before you let him go.’

  Adam nodded. ‘I get that. The thing is… The young bloke, the one who I thought was helping me, who in fact was actually probably helping me because the chances are I would still… Anyway, he said he was waiting for the dew to form. He told me I should pay more attention to the dew.’

  Anna stared at him. Grace ate slowly and looked a little confused.

  ‘What sense have you made of that?’ It was Anna’s turn to be gentle now.

  Adam shrugged. ‘I haven’t. I’ve left it alone, treated it like a dream. I think one of the advantages of living like this is that you don’t have to give a name to things that happen.’ Both Anna and Grace looked at him and waited. ‘It’s true, I get that we can label it, I get that I was pretty messed up, I was randomly taking drugs that might change my mental state… I was probably experiencing something a bit like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, but we didn’t use those words then, so we called it not coping. Or I was unconsciously looking for a route out of something that had become very destructive…’

  ‘When did you start believing in an unconscious?’ smiled Grace.

  Adam half laughed. ‘Well, the boy I spoke to on three occasions—and this is the weird part and I have never said any of this out loud before by the way—when he came to help me with Tim and he took some of the weight, I felt him.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ said Anna.

  ‘I mean the weight did get easier, he was physically present. I smelt him, we touched shoulders as we steadied ourselves… I know I am out of touch with the world of mental health and I may have forgotten everything, but that is a strange psychosis, isn’t it?’

  Grace nodded. ‘Strange maybe but…’

  ‘What did he look like?’ asked Anna.

  ‘Good looking, light brown wavy almost curly hair, lots of it, very blue eyes, grey canvas jacket, blue jeans.’

  Anna had closed her eyes. ‘I suspect this makes me officially mad,’ she said. ‘But mine too.’

  ‘Yours too?’ said Grace.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Anna. ‘He sounds a lot like mine. Let me tell you about my day.’

  Tom and Laura had vowed to have sex in every bed they ever slept in together. They were believers in shared firsts. The first night they stayed there was the first time they had had sex in Margate and the sex they had just had was the first sex they had had since their parents knew they were a couple. They had sex together outside of England for the first time in 2009. Anna believed Tom was in Spain with friends. Grace believed Laura was in France. In truth they were both in Portugal, feeling like Bonnie and Clyde and having sex. Including the
first sex they had outdoors.

  ‘Have you heard your mum come in yet?’ asked Laura.

  ‘I haven’t been listening,’ Tom said. ‘But no, I don’t think she is taking us in her stride,’ he said softly.

  ‘To be fair, Tom, she has had a lot to deal with.’ Laura lay with her head on his shoulder, Tom stroked her arm and played gently with her hair. ‘Does it feel different to you, them knowing?’

  ‘Not really, but then I haven’t seen my mum yet. Does it feel different to you?’

  ‘I don’t think so. I think if we had started seeing each other when we were still living at home it would have been weird, like it had something to do with them… but now? I think maybe we grew up.’

  She reached her hand across and gently touched his face. ‘That’s no bad thing.’

  He kissed the top of her head. ‘So, where are we going to live?’

  ‘Where do you want to live?’

  ‘With you,’ he said quickly.

  She giggled. ‘OK, where?’

  ‘Anywhere.’

  ‘Well, you need to be in Manchester for the next year doing your MA. The best place for me to get a house job is Cambridge, so for a year or so…’

  ‘I don’t want to wait a year.’

  Laura looked at him. ‘Neither do I, but—’

  ‘I don’t need to do this MA. I could get a job near Cambridge.’

  ‘Really? Doing what?’

  ‘Bar work.’

  ‘Yeah, that’ll make you happy.’

  ‘Don’t you want me to come to Cambridge?’ He sounded petulant.

  ‘Hey, where is this coming from?’ She sat up and took his face in both hands. ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I suppose… if we are noticing that we’re grown ups I’d quite like to live like grown ups. Together. Looking at Adam, mum, your mum, they’re all on their own, they’ve always been on their own. I think that’s sad. I get that that’s what they chose, but I don’t want that.’

  ‘You haven’t got that and neither have I,’ Laura had tears in her eyes. ‘I love you.’

  ‘You say that…’ he laughed.

  ‘I do love you.’ Staying under the duvet she moved her leg across his body and sat astride him.

  ‘So marry me then,’ he said. ‘Please.’

  She moved her head to one side and smiled, asking without speaking if he was serious. He smiled and nodded. ‘OK,’ she said. She kissed him softly on the lips. ‘And let’s not keep it a secret.’

  ‘He’s aged pretty well,’ said Grace.

  ‘A lot better than might have been anticipated,’ smiled Anna.

  It was 1am and the two women were walking slowly back along the coast road to the Bed and Breakfast. It was a cool evening but not cold. A bright moon shone on the cloud cover and the sound of the sea lent them a peacefulness they wouldn’t have constructed alone.

  ‘Were you tempted to stay?’ Grace asked.

  ‘He didn’t ask.’

  ‘He would have if I hadn’t shown up. Sorry.’

  ‘Oh don’t be silly.’ It had crossed Anna’s mind. Not the idea of sex, not at first anyway, but the idea of staying at Adam’s. Of not having to sleep in a room next door to Tom and Laura. But then she wondered about sex, she wondered what it would be like to make love to someone she made love to a quarter of a century ago. If she would remember, or if they would simply make each other feel like shadows. But she didn’t think about it in a wanting way; she may have forgotten how to want. She just thought about it and then it passed.

  ‘So what are you going to do?’

  ‘About Adam? Nothing.’

  ‘No, about this meeting.’

  ‘I’m going to go to it,’ she said, surprising herself. ‘I think I have to and I think I need to.’

  ‘Would you like me to come?’

  ‘No, but thank you. I will drive up, go to my place in the morning, head on up north tomorrow evening, book into a hotel…’

  ‘I don’t mind coming,’ said Grace.

  ‘It’s OK, I need to do it on my own.’

  ‘Don’t you always,’ said Grace.

  The next morning, Anna went down to breakfast and explained to the landlady that a good friend had travelled down the previous night and had stayed with her. ‘I will pay extra.’

  ‘Ten pounds for breakfast,’ said the landlady with a glint in her eye. ‘I do not charge extra for your friend. I in the sisterhood.’ And she winked.

  Grace went and knocked tentatively on Tom and Laura’s door.

  ‘Just a minute,’ shouted Tom.

  All Anna heard when he finally opened the door was Laura shouting: ‘Mum!’

  Anna had finished her breakfast and was on her third cup of tea when they all came bounding down. Grace hardly noticed the landlady winking at her. ‘Tell her,’ Grace said. ‘Tell her,’ she said loudly.

  ‘Mum.’ Tom was blushing. ‘Laura and I are getting married.’

  Anna knew that she was allowed two or maybe three seconds of not speaking in order to eliminate all the things that are unsayable from her mind. These included ‘Why?’ ‘Is she pregnant?’ and ‘Isn’t that a bit sudden?’ To her own amazement, she bought herself a few more seconds by starting to cry.

  ‘That’s what I did,’ said Grace, who began to cry again. But Tom was staring at his mother, waiting, expecting something other than joy, expecting complaint. He didn’t know where the expectation came from, he had never articulated it before, although he had a sense that he had invited it the day before by being short and irritable with her and feeling guilty about it.

  Anna shook her head and stood up. She put her arms gently around her son and whispered: ‘You all growed up now?’

  ‘Wasn’t that my part of the bargain?’

  Anna let go and hugged Laura. ‘He is very lucky,’ she said, and she meant it and she was happy. But she also felt something else, and she couldn’t find a name for it yet.

  Adam opened the shop a little before 9.20. Not because he was expecting customers but because he could.

  At 9.30 Alison came in smiling. ‘How did the cooking go?’

  ‘Needed fish but OK, thanks.’

  ‘I enjoyed yesterday, thank you. I’ve never been on a boat before, not a little one like that.’ She seemed relaxed, eyes wide, shoulders less taut.

  ‘Have you come to talk basements?’ he said evenly.

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘Sort of. Mostly I came to say thank you, though.’ More formal, pulling herself gently back.

  ‘Would you like a cup of peppermint tea? And you can tell me your plan.’

  ‘Thank you, yes.’

  Adam made tea and Alison browsed through books. ‘I don’t really read much fiction,’ she said. ‘Except on holiday that is’.

  ‘It can slip out of life too easily, I think,’ said Adam neutrally.

  ‘I think the move here, getting settled, my brother… other things that have been going on make ordinary pleasures more disposable. Do you know what I mean?’

  Adam didn’t. It didn’t feel like an invitation to ask questions. In truth he had nothing to say and didn’t have the energy to construct something, so he nodded, waited a few moments and said: ‘So, talk to me about my basement.’

  Grimy Nige and Jim came in. Jim nodded. Grimy Nige simply said: ‘We came in early in case you were planning on going out anywhere today.’

  ‘No, no plans.’

  Grimy Nige looked disappointed. ‘Well if you change your mind…’

  ‘Yeah, thanks fellers.’

  ‘I was wondering if you would consider renting out your basement to me. Well, to my brother and me.’ Alison was looking him directly in the eye.

  ‘What do you want to do down there?’

  ‘Sell records.’


  ‘Records as in LPs?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is there a demand for records?’ Adam asked.

  ‘Yes. The nearest record shop is Canterbury. My brother, my brother has a mental health problem. I told you that. It is psychotic in nature. It is usually reasonably well controlled although sometimes he gets unwell. He is living almost independently and the only thing he has ever really loved is music. He plays guitar, very well, but mostly he loves records. He collects them and reads about them and remembers them.’

  ‘I used to know someone a bit like that.’ Adam said. ‘He loved pots. Loved them so much he couldn’t sell them.’

  ‘My brother isn’t like that. When he got ill at first he held on to himself, but as he got older and began to spend more and more time in and out hospitals he lost part of himself, his softness I think. He had to. If he’d stayed vulnerable they’d have eaten him alive on those wards. But music… He loves it and he loves sharing it. He’s become a sort of record detective, online. People ask him if such and such a record is available and he loves finding it. If he had a shop, somewhere to do that from, where people came, it would be great for him.’

  Adam looked at her. It had been hard for her to say all of that, she had folded her arms across her chest when she had finished speaking and her shoulders had hunched again.

  ‘Why me and why here?’ he asked.

  ‘I like it here, this place is nice. It feels nice.’

  ‘If it has anything to do with the fact that I used to be a nurse…’

  ‘No. I promise. If anything, that’s almost a reason not to ask. The last thing he needs is another nurse. Hell, he has me hassling him enough. He hates psychiatry, all of it.’

  ‘How old is he?’

  ‘Twenty-seven.’

  ‘What does he think about this idea?’

  ‘He thinks it is the most perfect thing he could ever imagine.’

  ‘A perfect thing?’ Adam smiled for the first time. ‘OK, I’ll think about it. There are logistical issues. We’d have to change the layout of the shop to allow access, we’d need to clear out downstairs and rig it up with better lighting… There will be building regs to consider. Would he sell coffee?’